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Sunday, February 24, 2008

Rethinking Writing Rules -- Pt. 2

By Mike Duran

Mike’s stories have appeared in Relief Journal, Coach’s Midnight Diner, Forgotten Worlds, Alienskin, Infuze Magazine and Dragons, Knights and Angels, with articles in The Matthew’s House Project, Relevant Magazine and 316 Journal. Mike is currently part of the editorial team for the Midnight Diner’s second edition. He and his wife Lisa live in Southern California, where they have raised four children. You can visit him at his website, deCOMPOSE.


After my last post, one commenter called me "a brave, brave man." I couldn't help but translate that as "brainless buffoon." Sure, "I Fought the Law (and the Law Won)" was my theme song in high school. But now having raised four children (none of whom are incarcerated, addicted to illegal substances, atheists or liberals), I can attest to the necessity of rules.

However, so did the Pharisees.

I recently submitted a story to a Christian writer's contest. The judges follow a checklist that contains 20 categories, with a maximum of 5 points per category. Some of those categories include these items:


  • Has the author observed the required manuscript format? (Courier or Times New Roman 12 pt double spaced) Is the type neat? Does it have 1 inch margins all around?

  • Is the point of view consistent? Are POV changes smooth and logical?

  • Does the writer utilize showing and telling skillfully?

  • Is there an opening line or paragraph that immediately hooks the reader into the story?

  • Are character motivations powerful enough to create sufficient conflict?

  • Is the dialogue between characters natural and not stilted, revealing plot and emotion in a way that narrative cannot?

No doubt there are rules that govern good stories, not to mention rules that govern good contests. I mean, who would argue that "sufficient conflict" and "natural dialog" aren't essential to a well-told tale? But do these types of checklists ultimately help or hurt storytellers? Dotting our i's and crossing our t's is necessary in a court of law. Yet in the court of public opinion, how important is a consistent POV? Does the “checklist mentality” place style above story, and potentially produce Pharisees whose primary aim is to follow the rules rather than spin yarns?

I recall submitting a piece to my writing group once, and a moderator pointed out my repeated use of “was,” a dreaded passive. "It was shrill." "She was dwarfish." "The prosthetic leg was really a telescope." In the throes of frustration, I submitted this post to the entire group as penance:

was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was,was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was, was

There. Now I’ve got it out of my system.

Mike

I eventually became so paranoid about using passives that I would spend hours, literally, weeding them from my work. (Remember, I’m a legalist.)

And that legalism eventually robbed me of reading pleasure. Passive tenses began popping up everywhere -- most notably in books endorsed as must-reads -- and I nit-picked them to death. For instance, I happened to pick up Winter's Tale, Mark Helprin's acclaimed novel, and read the first sentence:

THERE was a white horse, on a quiet winter morning when snow covered the streets gently and was not deep, and the sky was swept with vibrant stars, except in the east, where dawn was beginning in a light blue flood. (italics mine)

Four passives in the first sentence! Where were the gatekeepers when you needed them? Here I'm busting my ass to weed out was's, and some dude pops out quadruplets in the first sentence. My writing group would have a conniption.

Do you see a pattern here? I learned the rules and rigorously applied them, only to see them broken. Repeatedly. Something had to give.

There’s no question that:

"The prosthetic leg was really a telescope."

is not as good as

"The prosthetic leg unscrewed to reveal a telescope."

But what’s ideal and what’s acceptable are two different things. The Master of Horror concedes as much. Stephen King, in his wonderful book On Writing, says this:

I won’t say there’ no place for the passive tense. Suppose, for instance, a fellow dies in the kitchen but ends up somewhere else. The body was carried from the kitchen and placed on the parlor sofa is a fair way to put this, although “was carried” and “was placed” still irk the shit out of me. I accept them but I don’t embrace them. (pg. 123)

Well, there it is. Bells, whistles and angelic choirs. "I accept them but I don’t embrace them." The use of passives is tolerable, but not ideal. Just like the rest of the “writing rules,” their bend-ability is in the eye of the beholder.

So I took back a few was’s.

Think about it: If the primary goal of a story is to take us somewhere, then the “writing rules” must be subservient to that end. Much like a map, the aesthetics are secondary to the functionality. It is required first of the mapmaker to know which way North is. A colorful, good-looking map that replaces roads with rivers and cities with salt plains, is moot. Try as I might, Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings maps will not get me to the Shire. However, his stories will.

Perhaps this is what we should first teach aspiring novelists, not about passives, POV, and show v. tell, but about getting people to the Shire.

After four years of straining at gnats and swallowing camels, the following observation has been painfully liberating: The majority of readers aren’t writers; they read to be entertained, mystified, scared and inspired, not to be enthralled by style. The style of the story -- and the rules that govern its writing -- are not nearly as important as the story itself. The public hardly seemed concerned that the DaVinci Code was, at best, stylistically pedestrian. They wanted to be transported to a world of religious intrigue, which they were to the tune of 60 million copies worldwide.

The moral: It’s up to the reader to decide how many passives are tolerable.

It’s true that aspiring authors need rules. Just like that 5 year-old who lunges into the street, the author with a propensity for passives deserves a spanking. While the 16 year-old who lunges into the street deserves to get run over, the novelist who overuses the passive tense risks only readers, not life and limb. Either way, the rule is not a magic formula for safety or success, it is simply meant to get one across the street.

Far too many aspiring authors are looking for formulas. I say that as an aspiring author. And sadly, far too many teachers are available to accommodate us. It’s created an echo chamber of sorts, a community of overly-eager authors determined to cross their t’s and dot their i’s, ceaselessly pining for the Holy Grail of publication, ever enforcing and venerating the commandments of their own making.

The writing rules have their place, but they can also blind one to the destination. After all, the ultimate goal of the storyteller is not to obey all the rules, but to get her readers safely to the Shire.

19 comments:

  1. Yes, I've come to terms with my feelings on "was." I try to avoid the was's in my writing, but I don't make myself nuts about it (there are enough other things to be nuts about).

    And tons of things--good things- I read have plenty of them. And they don't bother me. I actually remember your "was, was, was..." post.

    Hmmm...what contest could that be?

    By the way, WAS, "busting my ass," the best way your could think of to express yourself there?

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  2. I know how you feel, Mike. I once got chastised for using "was" in my dialogue. I mean, if my character says "was", I have to type "was", right?

    I think there may be a publisher peer pressure element here.

    Publishers want to be able to brag about the quality of the writing they publish. They already readily admit that they don't really know what will be a bestseller or not.

    So the only measureable pre-bestseller component of what good writing is - is the author's adherement to the rules.

    Which is fine. But, everyday a book is published that breaks some of the rules.

    I'd like to believe (and do) that most editors are looking for a story that gets them to the Shire without hitting every pothole along the way.

    But then again, except for obvious great stories like LOTR, the road to the Shire is veiled in the fog subjectivity.

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  3. Great subject, Mike. I think it's great to know all the rules. There's no doubt that strong craft shines, and there's no excuse for ignoring craft if you want to be published.

    On the other hand, breaking the rules can have purpose, lend passion, and give freedom to the author bound by legalism. Chuck Palahniuk, for example, breaks just about every rule, but he comes up with some genius moments.

    Aren't words and language amazing?

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  4. I think your comment about the echo chamber is very true. I would also like to say that it is very possible for a novelist to follow all of the rules and still produce terrible writing, whereas when a child follows the rule about staying out of the street we have reason to believe that he will not be run over by a car.
    Weak style can kill a novel, but style alone won’t sell the novel. For standalone novels without a recognizable author, I believe the premise of the novel is what sells the novel rather than adherence to the rules.

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  5. That was a great post.

    :-)

    Truly, I'm freeing myself from that same sort of legalism, but I must say you've made a wee little error in your essay. Was is not necessarily passive in all your examples. It is when used as a helper verb where the action is being done to the subject:

    The essay was written by Mike.

    However:

    Mike was a genius is not passive. It's using a *weak* verb. Or it can be, depending on the context of the sentence.

    Yet I've found that sometimes was is the best verb for the situation. Like the word *said* it becomes invisible in the sentence, highlighting the words surrounding it.

    What I see often when I edit others' work is a flow problem. If there are too many choppy was sentences, I make note of it. Or if every sentence flows in a S-V format, never varying it. More than weeding out was, we'd do better to read our work aloud and hear how our sentences sound.

    Mary DeMuth
    http://www.wannabepublished.blogspot.com

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  6. Great post, Mike. You know what would have made it better though? Some daisies in the background. ; )

    I'm reading now with an eye for what writers are sucessfully getting away with. It's intriguing to see something and think, you can't get away with that, but then realizing that they did. It worked for me as a reader.

    Sometimes they shouldn't have gotten away with it but it's absolutely delightful when a writer takes a chance, breaks some rules and makes it work.

    ps. maybe next week we should rerun "Counting Curse Words". Actually, I really do love that piece.

    Thanks, Mike!

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  7. Hey, thanks for taking time with this piece and all the terrific comments! Mary, if I've only made "a wee little error," I'll take that as an accomplishment. I think your observation may actually illustrate my point. As a legalist, I look for rules to follow. When I first learned about passives, it was far easier to follow the "letter of the law" and hack and slash than it was to dig into all the nuances of grammar and style. Had someone pointed this out to me (and if I'd not been so anal), I probably wouldn't have obsessed so much over the word "was." The fact that I did is as much an indictment of my mind-set, as it is of the formulaic approach so many writing mentors perpetuate. Thanks so much, Mary, for clarifying this. Grace to you!

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  8. Funny you should mention the invisibility of "said," Mary. That's one of the rules that has become so glaring to me, in recent months. It's the rule d'jour. I don't like sloppy tags and beats, but the die-hard adherence to that one word has, in my mind, become a form of legalism and laziness as well.

    Or so Eric said. lol

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  9. Love your post, Mike.

    Mary makes an important observation that "was" doesn't always indicate passivity. That's a matter of confusion for a lot of people, I think, just like the "eliminate adverbs" rule writers militantly apply to "ly" words, not realizing adverbs are everywhere (e.g., "everywhere" is an adverb). Adverbs answer the questions, when, where, why, and under what conditions, and they're absolutely ("ly" word I plan to keep) necessary to story telling.

    I've lost count of how many times I've read or heard exhortations to pare away adverbs, prepositional phrases, and weak verbs to tighten writing. Certainly we want to tell stories in the most compelling way, but for some of us, that includes attention to phrasing. I love beautiful, lyrical writing. Sometimes a long, musical sentence works best ("best" = adverb) where a short, punchy sentence construction would destroy the mood.

    I've said this before, and I'll say it again. Language is like the soundtrack playing behind the story. One size does NOT fit all. Language matters to me, and it will always matter to me, no matter how many people tell me it shouldn't.

    Of course, I'm not competing for the title of commercial fiction queen, either. I'd rather take my time creating a gourmet word feast than join an assembly line making regimented clone burgers. For now at least I have that luxury. If we ever need my writing income to survive, I may have to switch to the literary equivalent of fast food.

    And now, even though this comment is already too (adverb) long, I will add the necessary disclaimer: I'm NOT suggesting all the books hitting the shelves are clone burger books. Excellent works by brilliant and creative folks (some of whom are also dear friends) are hitting the shelves, much to my great joy and delight. However, if you read them, you won't get the sense the rule-Nazis hovered over these folks' shoulders.

    Let's learn, and then let's cut loose and dance. It's a lot more fun when you let the music move you and forget about counting steps.

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  10. Jeanne, you've left my head spinning (ala Linda Blair). I had the "adverb demon" exorcised a while back, only to have it return with seven more powerful than itself. And Gina, you sure do get a kick out of my MySpace daisies, don't you. I can only imagine what you'd say about my weekly whale sperm facial mask and pedicure. Geez! And here I thought cultivating my feminine side would garner points...

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  11. Funny stuff Mike....comparing "liberals" to atheists, drug addicts, and criminals. Likewise, writing Christian fiction can't be made too dificult by using passive phrases, multi-syllable,convaluted words, and compound sentences. Might want to consider using a crayon if you're writing for the Bush crowd.

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  12. Good post, Mike. Interesting to see your thoughts, as I'm about to write some posts on "the rules" for my own blog this week.

    Bottom line for me--the "rules" keep me on my toes. Using "was" (which, as Mary said, is a weak verb, not necessarily a passive sentence), using adverbs, using speaker attributes such as "said"--these all can lead to weaker writing. They're EASY to write. It's far easier to write, "he said" than to create a dynamic action beat that will enhance the scene. It's far easier to throw in an adverb than to find a more compelling verb. So these techniques are for me the last resort. If I use an adverb, it's done intentionally, with careful thought that it is, indeed, the best approach for the sentence. Same for "was" and speaker attributes.

    As for gnashing our teeth over seeing these words in published books--I think there's a deeper dynamic going on. But I shall leave my thought at that for now and take it up in my own posts.

    Thanks, Mike, for your insights.

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  13. True, rules can be a noose that strangles the life out of a thing. On the other hand, rules usually arise out of long, hard-won lessons that are of value too great to be quickly dismissed. Before we throw the baby out with the bath water (a cliche that suggests death by disregard of rules can happen too) we writers ought to consider mastering rules before casting them aside. Writers who are masters possess a genuine understanding of why the rules exist in the first place. What effects do rules have on story and storytelling? How do rules get us to the Shire?(They can and do.) Only masters who possess THIS knowledge can break rules intentionally and effectively. Writers who take the to-hell-with-rules-I'll-do-it-my-way approach are more like adolescents, who think they're cool but really are only embarrassing themselves with immature craft.

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  14. Hurray! I've found people who truly understand that adverbs aren't just -ly words, that passive and weak are two different things, and understanding the reason for the rules is essential before trying to break them! One of my former critiquers tried to tell me that my gerunds (nouns ending in -ing) were passive. How can a noun be passive? Thanks so much for this post and comments.

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  15. Brandilyn, thanks so much for your comments. I agree that viewing passives, adverbs, and speaker attributions as "weaker writing" is much more constructive than branding them as stylistically intolerable. Looking forward to the posts at your website.

    And Erin, I trust you're not construing my advice as a "to-hell-with-rules-I'll-do-it-my-way approach," because it's not. As in rearing children, there must be a balance between the letter and the spirit of the Law. My concern in this post is not that there are "writing rules," but that the "spirit" of Story, that the joy and liberty of storytelling (what Jeanne meant when she said "let's cut loose and dance"), isn't quenched by an overemphasis upon formula... especially for new writers.

    Linda, thanks for joining in! I'm not sure I've ever heard the word "gerunds" before. However, I will agree that "critiquers" sometimes perpetuate bad advice. And Eliot, the sad truth is that atheists and liberals often share ideologies. Grace to you all!

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  16. Mike, this is so close to my tomorrow's post, it's scary! Wow. I'm just now reading this and I wrote mine on Friday or Saturday. Hmm.

    Good work. :)

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  17. Glad we trained you right. ;)

    Actually, was is a perfectly decent word, used right. We have to learn the good writing rules to learn to break them with panache.

    But be honest, Mike, I haven't rapped your knuckles with my ruler in a long time.

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  18. No, Mike, I didn't mean to include you in that unbalanced group of writers at all. Apologies for coming off that way! When I'm not writing, I'm editing, and I was referring to the attitudes of a few writers I have encountered. They have the opposite problem of the Pharisees in that they think they can fulfill the spirit of the laws without paying any attention to the laws themselves--but now I'm getting unnecessarily abstract. I'm in agreement with you about the miseries of emphasizing formula.

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  19. Unlike the Law that the Pharisees were trying to keep, the “rules of writing” are more along the lines of suggestions or rules of thumb. The “spirit of the law” in this case is that we, as authors, want to keep our readers interested in the story. Some of the rules are very good suggestions and following them can be helpful and reaching our goal, but following the rules is not a guaranteed route to keeping our readers interested. The fact is that if an author were to throw the rulebook out the window and write in such a way that he finds the story interesting as he reads it then the readers would enjoy it also.

    Along that line, I think too many authors focus on the characters rather than the story. The author creates Jane and John, and then follows their story. The author likes Jane and John so much that she avoids doing anything to harm them or her mental image of them. If the focus was on the story, the author would do everything she could to kill Jane and dare John to stop her.

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